A beta version of Windows 7 is out on BitTorrent.

You can get a copy and run it before you’re supposed to – but it’s illegal; and if you live in the UK, or possibly some other countries in Europe, you’ll be aware that certain ISPs are watching you.

It might be a mistake to download it, because it’s not possible to apply security updates to the bootleg version. That includes the recent "out of band" update for a seriously critical vulnerability in Internet Explorer.

The build which was leaked was a daily build for the beta, probably only for the development purposes of Microsoft staff. It wasn’t supposed to be leaked; and those who do have legal access to it have access to a proper beta version which may include the fix.  Microsoft has no reason to release a patch for this version; after all it’s not supposed to be in the wild. If you download this version you are risking your online safety.

Microsoft’s 30GB Zunes are failing on a colossal scale. Around 2AM, (In an American time-zone presumably. My source is indefinite as to which one.) 30GB Zunes that were switched on reset themselves. When they were switched on again they froze in the loading process, becoming totally unresponsive and practically useless.

Zune users have dubbed this crisis Z2K9; a parody of the Y2K bug. (Although the New Year hasn’t even started at time of writing. Reports of this problem are continually appearing across the internet.

It would seem that the bug lies within the latest firmware at this point; as many who failed to update their firmware seem to be unaffected.

The source material I used was unable to give a proper explanation as to why this was happening; and as yet I am none the wiser myself. I’m sure that an explanation will soon be forthcoming though.

It’s certainly one method of advertising; but probably not a good one.

Have you had similar problems? If so please do tell in the comments.

Addendum: Here’s the official fix: -

“Microsoft’s responded to the Zune 30GB failure, blaming a leap-year handling bug. And they’ve provided a fix. Which is to wait til New Years, when the bug will go away by itself…”

Read more…

The Vista blacK Screen of Death, or KSOD, (BSOD is already taken.) has been appearing rarely and at random since November in systems located here, there, and everywhere.

Let’s get straight to it. Yes I snagged this lot; but what the —- ? Let’s fix it: -

"There is a fix, courtesy of Mark from the SBSC & MSP Buzz Blog. He says the problem is related to the RPC service running under the LocalSystem account as opposed to the NT Authority\NetworkService account, and I quote:

• On the affected machine, boot using the Vista Media and Select "Next" and then in the bottom left you will see "Repair your Computer"; select Next and then Select Command Prompt.

• At the command prompt, launch regedit.exe and load the SYSTEM hive, follow the below steps.
  • a. Select HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE

• b. On the File menu, select Load Hive.

• c. Browse to %WINDIR%\System32\Config Folder and select "SYSTEM"

• d. Select Open.

• e. In the Load Hive dialog box, type in "MySYSTEM" box for the registry hive that you want to edit.

• After the hive is loaded, modify the following key value per the instructions below: You will need to know what ControlSet the machine is currently running on, this can be determined by going to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\MySYSTEM\Select and find the "Current" value in the Right hand side. (Example: Current value is 1 then the ControlSet will be ControlSet001)

Key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet00X\

• Services\RpcSs (X is the Number from the Current Key from above)
  Value Name: ObjectName
  Old Value: LocalSystem
  New Value: NT AUTHORITY\NetworkService

• Unload the SYSTEM hive by selecting the key "MySYSTEM" and then select "File->Unload Hive" menu item.

• Exit regedit.exe

• Reboot the system normally "

Something is changing the ObjectName key value, but nobody is yet sure what.

I thought I’d make a quick post; additional to what I had planned, just so that Vista users experiencing this problem have an extra reference – point for a solution. …As well as a chance for me to put up some more adverts:-

All the answers to this quiz can be found somewhere within the latest 15 posts on this blog as at time of posting, or on the Home Page.

Give it a go and see how well you do: -

• 1. What subject do I have analogue and digital qualifications in?

• 2. Signs of which syndrome include raised capillaries near to the dermal surface, sometimes causing vivid birthmarks and intermittent dermal haemorrhage, especially during periods of exercise and stress?

• 3.What American city is set to host the CES in January 2009?

• 4. In which county of England was the location of the photographic bar where Sarah Ferguson’s laptop was left?

• 5. What processor have I installed in my new-build computer?

• 6. How many becomeablogger affiliate adverts appear on the home page including the sidebar?

• 7. What percentage of disk – space does Windows XP allocate to System Restore on each disk by default?

• 8. Which company that I advertise is a FTSE-listed company that won an award from Which? magazine?

• 9. What bookmarking site is this the logo of:  ?

• 10.Which of the following two statements is true? :-

A. The higher the frequency the smaller the antenna needed to radiate that frequency.

B. The higher the frequency the larger the antenna needed to radiate that frequency.

Check your answers here.

How did you do? What is your rank? : -

1 to 4 = Fleeting glancer.

5 to 8 = Reading regular.

9 = Almost addicted.

10 = Fantastic fanatic.

British Telecommunications (BT) appear to have a good and fairly reliable standard of service with respect to their technology and technological services; such as internet, telephone, and the other technologies that they cover. I find that it’s pretty solid, made of sturdy stuff, and things rarely go wrong.

When they do go wrong, though, the flaws start to show. I’ve mentioned this a few times before, and I feel that it’s a subject that I should cover again, as despite my earlier posts, as well as the public’s experiences with their appalling customer-services regarding their foreign call-centres, combined with my reporting them for dodgy advertising practices and awful customer relations practices, nothing seems to have changed: They just nonchalantly carry on regardless.

Whenever I ring BT for whatever reason I get stress. They usually pass me around departments; each one of which interrogates me with the same stet spiel before passing me on to the next. Most are in India and I have to say everything in triplicate before they understand me anyway. As a bonus they appear to have been trained to think that no BT customer is intelligent enough to use a word of more than 2 syllables or to have any idea whatsoever of using a computer. When I do finally get through to the right department, I usually find that I’m talking to a fairly young Indian girl with an extremely strong Indian accent who appears to think she knows everything there is to know about everything, talks down to me in a patronising manner – slowly as if I was retarded – avoiding using technical terms, and despite my indicating that I build computers and install software + have qualifications in analogue and digital electronics, treating me as if I was a technophobe with an IQ of 10. If I ask to talk to her supervisor it takes about 10 minutes to get her supervisor on the line after 5 minutes of requesting; only for the supervisor to read from the same script that was earlier read to me, and tell me that she can’t help me any further than she already has, but if I’d like to pursue the matter further I should ring another of BT’s trillions of departments, (Probably in a room next door, or at the back of the call-centre in India.) on such-and-such a number. (When I do I find that I’m told that I’m speaking to the wrong department, and after being transferred through another X departments – undergoing identification interrogation at each of them, I find I end up speaking to the same Indian girl who offers to put me on hold while she transfers me yet again; after which the line goes dead.

Right BT: I’ve had enough. – As have millions of others who’ve switched their telephone service and/or ISP to another provider.

- They’re crafty bleeders too: Every time I phone them to get a better deal from them, (I must admit that they can be bargained and bartered with, and that’s a good thing. – But they’ll only drop a certain amount: If you push them too far they’ll just end the call.) I end up signing a 12 or 18-month contract in order to get what I want. That means that I spend over half the time tied to them.

A bit more on bartering with BT: If you feel that you’re not getting a fair deal, and/or you know that you can get a better deal elsewhere as regards price; ring their sales department – Which is at least partially located in the UK, ask to speak to someone in authority, and tell them exactly why you think you’re not getting a good deal from them.

Don’t lie: They may be incompetent but they’re not stupid. If you lie they’ll just politely tell you that they are unable to help you and end the call. Be honest with them and they’ll hopefully be fair with you. I can almost guarantee that they’ll tie you into a contract; but don’t be put off by that: If you’re properly self-aware then you’ll be able to negotiate further deals whilst under contract on the basis that you renew your contract for a full-term.

Snide Ba—rds!

OK back to the point: BT; you are getting to a point where you are going to shoot yourself in the foot if you squeeze any harder: That thing which you’re squeezing has become a trigger which will lead to your eventual self-destruction in the present economic climate. Either get your act together or prepare to slowly and tortuously go under.

I feel that the only reason why anyone would use BT’s internet services is because they’re less fault-prone than anyone else’s: That’s the positive side to them. They work and they work properly 99.99% of the time. – However, aside from their abysmal PR efforts, BT are rather expensive, also they’re neither the fastest ISP in the UK, nor are they future-proofed at the present moment. In fact Virgin Media are beginning to appear a nicer and nicer alternative as time goes by.

Virgin Media aren’t quite as reliable as BT in my opinion: They have got a lot better in this respect though, and they continue to do so. To anyone in a cabled area who’s thinking of changing ISP; I suggest Virgin Media as one of the best options. As for those in a non-cabled area; I suggest Virgin Media or BT – BT being the most reliable of the two for now, as two of the best options; whereas Virgin Media will probably have more chance of being the better of the two in the future. The choice is yours out of the two.

There is a single lower-cost provider who I would recommend to the same, even in some cases to a greater, extent than either of these two, though. More on that further down.

Other ISPs?

Other ISPs? Well I’m not too bothered about most other ISPs as far as landline communications are concerned. Mobile communications are a different matter and are outside the scope of this article. Most other ISPs probably use BT or Virgin Media’s equipment to carry their data, and probably buy up spare capacity in wholesale amounts; hence their pricing policies being discounted in some way. When something goes wrong, though, they have to check their own equipment first -The delay caused at this point can be anything between immediately and eternally. Following that, if they can’t find a fault, they have to ask their providers to check if there are any faults on the carrier equipment, which is requested but usually goes to the back of the queue. Some parts of some cheaper networks have been known to be down for weeks at a time in the past. – If you pay peanuts you get the services of monkeys.

BUT…

There is one that is cheap-er than BT, but is pretty reliable: That being the Utility Warehouse, who actually own a percentage of the network that they use, in addition to purchasing spare-capacity from other carriers. – Which is why I advertise them on this site. A FTSE-listed company that can win an award from Which? magazine must be worth considering as an option. I’ll say no more; but why not click on the ad and find out more about them? They’re a UK-only service currently, so I hope I haven’t wasted your time if you live outside the UK.

If there’s anything you’d like to add, contradict, or express an opinion on, then please do comment.

Korean company LG has introduced a mobile device of a type that only 35 years ago was in the realms of science-fiction. The LG-GD910 wrist-phone features support for 3G and HSDPA technology.

A 1.43-inch colour LCD-touchscreen displays a user-interface. The phone has a camera, which is integrated into the watch face. An outstanding feature of the device is that it also also offers text-to-speech (TTS) capabilities, Bluetooth, and MP3 playback. Additionally the wrist-phone allows voice dialling with speech-recognition.

Although pricing information has not yet been announced. the wrist-phone is due to debut in January 2009 at the CES in Las Vegas; following which it will be on sale in Europe and Korea before being retailed in the USA.

	Yesterday, Adrian Kingsley-Hughes for ZD Net reported news of his first look at Microsoft’s first beta for their new Windows 7 operating system. (See his original article here.) He says that this beta (build 6.1.7000.0.081212-1400) should be the first and only beta from Microsoft of Windows 7, and that it’s a good one. (see ZD Net’s  Windows 7 beta 1 review.)
- Oh dear: Is that "Windows 7 Ultimate" I see? Does that mean that there’ll be a Small Business, Tiny Business, Sole-Trader, Professional, Semi-Professional,Home Professional, Home Standard, Home Basic, Basic, Waster, Chav, and Loser, version of the operating system; similar to what happened with Vista?
	Will the Ultimate version cost 4 times as much as the Home Basic version again, just to have a few unimpressive and unnecessary features thrown in; again as it was with Vista? If so then Microsoft are slow learners!
AK-H makes four points formed from his opinion of the beta. I quote:- "There are no new features in this build. If Microsoft has any new stuff lined up for the RTM then we’re going to have to wait to find out. Features-wise, build 6.1.7000.0.081212-1400 is similar to earlier builds I’ve looked at (here are some posts for you to check out: 1, 2, 3). "	"This beta is of excellent quality. This is the kind of code that you could roll out and live with. Even the pre-betas were solid, but finally this beta feels like it’s “done.” This beta exceeds the quality of any other Microsoft OS beta that I’ve handled. " "Performance of this beta is exceptional. I’ve not had a chance to benchmark it yet but it feels snappier and more responsive than earlier betas I’ve handled." "Judging by the quality of this build, I expect Windows 7 to be released June/July of ‘09. I really can’t see Microsoft dragging out the release a year."

Hmm. – Excuse my dubiousness and cynicism; but I get the uneasy feeling that Microsoft are going to ruin what is otherwise a good operating system by creating a tiered pricing-structure similar to the one they did with Vista. – Starting from reasonable for the feature-scarce Home Basic version, and scaling up to astronomical for the full-featured Ultimate version.

Will they never learn?!

Whether or not the above actually does happen is yet to be seen: But I’d put money on it all the same. What’s your opinion?

Time for me to go all "Smashie & Nicey" on you in a pop-tastic kinda way; I’ve just found some super-sensational seasonal software from Sound Spectrum, for Windows or Mac, that’ll ensure that your computer sees in the New Year to the music in a fantastical funk-a-delic style with all the top trimmings-mungous taste of seasonal serene cyber-generated scenery.

From spinning glitter-clouds, sparkling Christmas-tree bulbs, scintillating snowflakes, popping bubbly-corks, boogy-ing snowmen, Canadian country scenes of winter with falling realistic-looking snowflakes… You have just got to experience it for yourself. The pictures just don’t do it justice:

Still-pictures alone simply cannot express this tune-tastic piece of software that gyrates and pulsates, changes colour and design-shape to tunes playing on your Media Player…Oh it’s all too much!

I have it running right now on my new-build comp running Windows XP with an AMD Athlon 64 x 2 2.2GHz CPU and 2GB of 667Mhz DDR2 RAM while the Windows Media Player 11 plays a compilation of tracks from the Ministry of Sound Funky House Sessions and also of course You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet by Bachman-Turner Overdrive.

This software is awesomely mega-tastic great mate. It’s a must to have on your PC or Mac this New Year’s Eve. The best thing is that you can download a free trial – less than a couple of megs in size -with a few features disabled before or if you buy the software. - Now that’s cha-a-a-ridee!

That’s what I’m running now and it is simply awesome in itself.

Sound Spectrum do some quite amazing software in that line, other than that described here. Their website is well worth checking out. Right now browse on down by clicking here and see what you think of this piece of software.

Perhaps I should have tried to find an affiliate program first? I have a feeling that this will boost sales. (?) Anyway – maybe unfortunately for me – I make nothing from it as yet if you buy this software.

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Windows is a good operating system in my opinion; particularly XP at time of writing. (Vista suffers from bloat.) One thing I’ve noticed with XP is how much disk space it allocates by default to System Restore: 12% of available disk space. That percentage can be quite a colossal amount on, say, a 1.5 terabyte disk. – And the more space occupied by the system, including System Restore, the less space available for you to store files.

Of course, the larger the disk, the more space Windows needs to store restore-point information: That is to say where a couple restore points covering all of the files on an 80GB drive could be crammed into, say, 4GB of space; it would take a lot more space to accomplish the same on a 1 terabyte disk. – Somewhere in the region of 50 gigabytes.

By allocating a proportion of the disk by a proportional percentage-value, rather than a given quantity of gigabytes, Windows always has enough available space to create a number of System-Restore points. However the percentage that Windows allocates for this purpose is to my mind overly large, and reserves too much space.

An option is to limit the percentage of the disk-space available to System Restore; which does limit the amount of restore points it can hold, but releases disk space for other things.

To do this:

*1 Right-click on the “My Computer” icon and select the System Restore tab.

*2 In the box select the disk on which you want to adjust the amount of space reserved for System Restore points and click “settings”.

*3 Adjust the amount of space using the slider. The default setting is 12% of your disk, but on disks of 160GB or more I find 6% is quite sufficient and a decent working amount.

If you have a disk below 40GB I don’t suggest changing this to below 10%, although I have got away with 5% before on a 40GB disk.

Do you think 12% is too much space; or do you think it better to sacrifice space to have more restore points available?

Blogging: It’s another popular bandwagon; and it seems that everyone is trying to climb on it these days. Of course there’s only so much room; so those who don’t stay balanced and upright are going to end up falling off and left behind as the bandwagon moves onwards.

With so many millions of blogs online these days; a large percentage of them trying to generate some kind of profit for their owners, it’s starting to get, shall we say "crowded" out there. Many bloggers are complete rookies; first-timers who are just getting their feet wet in the blogosphere. – People who may be being hit by the current economic climate and who have turned to blogging to make a little extra perhaps; or possibly full-time newbie-bloggers who are hoping to make their total income from blogging.

The unfortunate thing is that not all are going to make it: The laws of probability state that there must be losers for there to be winners.

The fortunate thing is that there are those who already have the necessary experience, and who have been watching the scene unfold and the changes taking place in the blogosphere over the last few years.

Two such people are Yaro Starak and Gideon Shalwick: These two experienced bloggers are quite successful in their field,

and have been observing the blogosphere changing with times and trends. They have teamed up to share their knowledge and expertise with the less-experienced and even the currently operative bloggers today.

They have put together the becomeablogger course; a course which takes you through the very basics, like initially setting up your WordPress blog, to optimising, monetising, and correctly commercialising your blog in the light of current internet-marketing trends, in order that you can make it a profitable operation whilst at the same time making it interesting and readable. – Generating enough traffic to make it a viable commercial and social knowledge-base, so that it not only pays for itself but it actually generates revenue from its operation.

The internet is changing; if you didn’t realise it already. The old ways of operating now have limited, if any, success. As a result of this, those who weren’t able to evolve are falling by the wayside. Yaro and Gideon have kept their fingers on the pulse and have adapted their strategies accordingly: In this course they’ll show you how to blog successfully in today’s online marketplace.

There is a mass of material you should read if you’re new to the blogging scene, and a lot of it is absolutely free of charge at Yaro and Gideon’s site. The real McCoy though – the bit that puts the meat on the bones and provides you with everything you’ll need to be a regular successful blogger who makes an income from their blogging activity, is contained within the becomeablogger tutorials.

That’s enough rabbit from me: Click on the ad below and grab yourself some free samples so that you can see for yourself that they know what they’re on about. You’d be crazy not to.

It’s Christmas Day 2008; and in view of that it just doesn’t seem right to post about technology today. – In fact most bloggers probably won’t be posting at all at this time. I’m my own person though; so as such I’m posting on Christmas Day 2008.

I write the odd Pagan article in this blog every now and again; because I can, and because I want to. Largely this is a technology-related blog; and as such it shall remain largely that way. As a Pagan, though, I see things from a Pagan perspective, and I therefore relate things from such a perspective. Although the subject of technology is very much identical despite whatever one’s religious beliefs may be; I do like to use this blog to focus, at times, on areas only loosely related to technology: Even at times I post the occasional article unrelated to technology, and this is one of those times:-

It being Christmas Day I thought I’d post about Christmas Day – And why not? Behold the following ramblings:-

I was watching the church service on BBC1 that interfaced Christmas Eve with Christmas Day: Yes I actually find even the Christian chants melodious; in a few cases even more so than a lot of the Pagan chants. – Anyway I was thinking of the Christian message at this time of year. A virgin birth? Yes it’s possible. There is a syndrome around even today, known as Turner’s Syndrome, where in certain women, unfertilised eggs can develop into embryos. Here’s an excerpt from a piece I wrote on Turner’s Syndrome in 2003, the content of which was sourced from a publication on the subject:-

"All such births are female and have a condition known as Turner’s Syndrome; signs of which include raised capillaries near to the dermal surface, sometimes causing vivid birthmarks and intermittent dermal haemorrhage, especially during periods of exercise and stress. Also breast development in these subjects is limited, however the rib cage is large in proportion to that of other females.

Despite having fully-formed female genitals; menstruation is uncommon in women with Turner’s Syndrome."

But Jesus (Latin) or Yeshua (Hebrew) was a man wasn’t he? Well allegedly so yes; but factually we have in reality no idea exactly what he looked like, or for that matter what sex he actually was. Note I said what sex he actually was: All indications from the Bible are that he was a male; but the validity of, in places contrary accounts written by a number of different men over 40 years plus after his death, does not in any way appear to constitute believable evidence. On the contrary in  fact; it would appear to be drawn from local memory and from hearsay more than from fact. Could he not just as easily have been a non-menstruating Turner’s Syndrome female posing as a man?

All we have are seemingly-erroneous accounts from a few of his friends written a long time after he died, plus further accounts of a similar nature written by people who never actually knew him in person. I refer here to the Gnostic Gospel writers as well as to the four Gospel-writers in the Christian Bible as it is today.

The Biblical accounts are all synonymous with one another in their claim that this person was the "Son of God". The first question is; which god? Well from the Jewish belief we can safely assume that the writers mean Yaweh, the Jewish god. Once again, though, there is little if any, solid concrete evidence for this claim. He could just as easily have been a Witch; after all he did have a coven of followers. Yes; the Biblical account says that he talked to his father, god (Yaweh).- But we’ve already had ample cause to dispute the validity of those accounts which were written years after his death.

I don’t mean to go much further with this article; and I’m not going to do so, other than to point out in summary that we can’t be sure, without at least a shadow of a doubt, that Yeshua was even male; nor can we be sure that he was the son of the Jewish god – or for that matter any god. What we can be sure is almost certainly wrong is that Christmas was not the time of the birth of Yeshua, but rather the time of a Pagan festival that was adopted by the church.

Although I don’t myself celebrate Christmas itself out of personal preference, preferring instead to celebrate the Winter Solstice or Yule on or around the 21st December only; I see no reason why it should be against Pagan beliefs to do so; bearing in mind its Pagan origins. There’s certainly nothing un-Pagan or anti-Pagan about doing so. It’s the Feast of Mithras after all, and all of the symbolism contained therein as regards the "Christian" celebration has Pagan origins:-

The Yule-log, the tree, the baubles on the tree representing the Sun; indeed Santa himself, have Pagan roots probably stretching back millennia.

Whether you’re Pagan, Christian, Jewish, Atheist, whatever; enjoy this festive time of year. This is a truly multi-theistic celebration that pretty much all faiths or non-faiths can celebrate. Enjoy it and season’s greetings to you all.

If you’d like to comment I’d be interested to know your thoughts on this.

- And don’t worry: I’ll be talking tech again very soon; so do drop by again for more in the line of geekery.

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Wishing all readers of this blog a Merry Christmas/Happy Hanukah, or whatever it is you’re celebrating.

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Not long ago, processor speeds just seemed to get faster and faster. In the last 10 years we’ve seen CPU speeds go up from around 233MHz to over 2.3 GHz: A tenfold increase in just ten years. – But suddenly they stopped getting faster. Why?

There are two combined main reasons: The first being market-forces.

Everybody continually demands more processing power from their processor; therefore chips became faster, as processors that were able to operate at greater speeds were developed; able to process the same amount of data more quickly. Due to a combination of the limited speed of the frequency of operation of the motherboard, plus design constraints that we will look at shortly, there was only so far that this could go. Secondly two brains are better than one. When you’ve gone as high as it’s realistically possible to go; they way to further increase capacity is to build outwards, or duplicate the structure as an annexe of the original.

That’s what chipmakers did: Around 2005; AMD, having developed a commercially-available 64-bit processor, then fabricated it as 2 of those processors on a single die. The Athlon 64 x 2 was born. (The computer I’m writing this article on now has one of these processors.) Intel stapled 2 dual-core dies together in a single package and produced a quad-core processor. At the time of writing 6 and 8-core processors are looming on the horizon.

But they’re still no longer getting any faster. Why?

CPU speed of operation is limited by frequency. Also, when you get up to a certain frequency,  greater heat is produced; regardless of the size of individual transistors: Heat that is generated by the frequency of operation itself to a certain extent. 

Go above a certain amount of gigahertz and you’re getting too close to microwave frequencies. At these extremely high frequencies a combination of things start to happen:

The frequency that individual components, such as the processor and the chipset, communicate with each other at, is around 200MHz: That’s the case with all computers. You may have a 3.2 GHz processor in circuit; but 3.2 GHz is the frequency within the processor itself only. If the processor were to try to communicate with other components at that frequency; the signal would never make it to the other components:

The higher the frequency the smaller the antenna needed to radiate that frequency. That’s the reason why the highest frequencies outside of any chip on the motherboard are limited: If they were any higher, the connective tracks on or between the layers of the motherboard would radiate the power away as radio-waves before it ever reached the next component. If the in-chip frequencies became too high then even the connections inside the chip would act as antennae and the chip itself would cease to function, regardless of the design of the transistors themselves.

Secondly; what happens when you put a dinner into a microwave oven? It cooks, yes?: What’s happening is that the high-frequency microwaves of several gigahertz are bombarding the food and exciting the (water) molecules to vibrate sympathetically, causing them to heat up. (I think the frequency used is around 5 point something gigahertz.)

When you’re talking gigahertz; the higher the frequency (The more gigahertz.) the greater the heat generated. Also the higher the frequency the smaller the components necessary to run at that frequency. Small things tend to burn up quicker than larger things. Go figure. The cost of fabricating a chip small enough to function at higher energy microwave frequencies, as well as the cooling system it would require, doesn’t even bear thinking about: It’s just totally impractical.

So once you’re getting above around 4+GHz frequency you’re starting to fight a losing battle. Logically if you can’t go upwards you go outwards. Think outside the box like AMD did: Add another core operating at an identical frequency on the same die and you theoretically and loosely have twice the frequency without having to have twice the frequency, if you catch my drift?

(In actual fact it’s not quite that simple: The overall performance gain works out at somewhere just above 1.7 times rather than double; but I’m not going to type a load of complex calculus-laden quantum-linear algorithms here to prove a point, even if I could remember them.)

So what of the future? 48-core processors? I think, making a logical guess, that that’s about the theoretical upper-limit using today’s technology: But things can only get better. All of this is talking from the viewpoint of today’s technologies of course: If it were possible to isolate the transmission of gigahertz-frequency waves and amplify and send them by means of a chain of nano-electronic relays over greater distances on an active-conductor, then basically the sky’s the limit as far as the number of processors in a package is concerned; once one accounts for the excessive cooling required for such a device… The mind boggles.

Someone leave a comment on their theoretical predictions based upon factual or theoretically-possible engineering concepts. I’d be fascinated to delve further into the realms of possibility, even from the mind of someone better-informed than myself. I’d love to hear your ideas.

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Are the secret Royal Codes now in the Public Domain? What other secrets accompany them?

On Thursday 18th December 2008, The Daily Telegraph reported that a laptop belonging to Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York, had been stolen when A thief broke into a photographic studio in Potters Bar, Hertfordshire, in England.

One of Fergie’s aides had taken the computer there in order to have private snaps of the Duchess, Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie, and her former husband Prince Andrew downloaded and archived.

They have very little, if any, chance of being published in a British newspaper, unless the editor is willing to be interrogated and probably charged by police. The thing is that there was almost definitely other data on the laptop’s hard-drive that was of a more sensitive nature: Passwords, address-book, secret royal codes? Would some mad identity thief attempt to pass herself off as Sarah Ferguson? It is a possibility.

Let’s hope that the Royals encrypt their data. Do they though? The UK Government don’t; or at least they didn’t: ‘Remember all the hoo-hah over the last couple of years when sensitive unencrypted records on disks were "lost" in the post, when ministers left laptops with unencrypted disks on the train, and when drives with unencrypted sensitive data were sold on eBay? The UK Royal Family will probably have to change all their passwords and security codes, if they haven’t already done so.

Whether or not the thief was an opportunist who stole the laptop to sell for drugs or similar; the criminals who end up with the machine in all probability are going to be trying every effort they can muster to get at the data on the hard-drive.

While the Duchess has had personal details disclosed in the past without her permission; could this lead to an expose’? Can you imagine headlines such as:-

"Laptop Thief Exposes Diana Death Royal Conspiracy" ?

Everything has both a negative and a positive side at the end of the day; although maybe not for the Royals if this were the case. – However such an occurrence is unlikely.

It does make one wonder, though, about what secrets are contained inside the laptops of the stars and the like.

If Madonna or some such celebrity were travelling on a train in the same carriage as you, and she left her laptop on the table when she got out; what would you do? Be honest now; and do tell.

Joy to the world; the Sun’s to rise; let’s hail the newborn light.
On every hill, in every glade.
The shining Sun pervade, heat, shadow, life is made.
The Earth goddess awakes.
No longer the long dark night.

Joy to the world; the darkness fades. The Holly King deposed.

Soon night will fade away, in the lasting light of day.

There’ll be warmth and light and joy. Ev’ry girl and ev’ry boy;

The sun shall rise from rest, to happiness attest.

In long days – and short nights.

The dark disposed.

Hail to the Sun; the light has come.

The dark nights are no more.

We welcome in the spring; bringing life to ev’rything,

And buds and chutes appear; as the Winter’s end draws near.

In the growing light of the Sun.

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Can you draw this?

In pencil? Photo to Sketch can:

In pen? Photo to Sketch can:

- If you buy the paid version you can even get it drawn in pastel.

All at the click of a mouse.

- But I’m content with the free version.

They say a picture paints a thousand words: Those three pictures have saved me one heck of a load of typing.

Results are virtually instant. Read more and download it for yourself here.

This add-on was entered into Mozilla’s Extend Firefox contest. While it didn’t win any prizes, it is nevertheless a rather useful add-on for some people who wish to surf in total privacy.

Just as its name suggests; it closes the current tab and "forgets" about it: It deletes all the relevant cookies, and can be configured to also forget all the pages of that domain so that they are not included in the browsing history.

Available in English, French, Spanish, and German languages, it adds a button to the toolbar which you click to forget all about that current tab.

I disclaim any responsibility for whatever use this add-on is put to by any readers who download and use it. I also very much doubt that it’ll "forget" any malware picked up from any dubious sites surfed, or other malicious sources. If your computer becomes a malware-hive as a result of indiscriminate dodgy-website surfing then it may well be your own fault for abusing this piece of software. This isn’t an opt-out for halfwits: Always remember to use safe-computing practices at all times, or your computer could well end up compromised.

You can go to the description and download page for this add-on by clicking here.

With all the economic prophecies of doom and gloom, plus talk of a deep worldwide recession; enhanced of course by the news media, who are making money from doom-mongering, you’d imagine that all industries were having a bad year during 2008. – But you’d be wrong: The computer industry’s retail sector, although having unexpected results, appears to be doing rather well:

The US figures for November 2008, released by the research firm, NPD Group, indicate that, while Apple made no progress but no losses either in this area, sales of PCs were up 7%.

-This despite the fact that sales of desktop PCs dropped by 20% overall. The fact seems to be that people are going for notebooks these days.

According to NPD analyst Stephen Barker: "For notebooks, there is a little extra value to consumers [to buy Apple], for desktops I’m not so sure. To me the real story is the iMacs need a refresh."

The forecast for this sector from IDC , which tracks sales of technology products, appears to nonetheless be rather gloomy: IDC said earlier this month that it expects global PC sales to fall 5.3% next year to $267 billion (£174.7 billion).

Would anyone care to speculate an opinion on their own thought regarding this? There is a comments section below, and you are allowed to use it. Who knows; people might just enjoy reading your comments too?

Do Macs require security-enhancing software? Apple appear to think not; that their osX is invulnerable and only PCs get viruses, at least seemingly from their advertising. Symantec, however, beg to differ; and have released Norton Internet Security 4.0 for the Mac.

As has been noted in recent articles on this blog; there is indeed Mac malware, and yes some Mac users have been subjected to the Macattack. – Maybe not many up until this time of writing, but even one is too many: Macs do need anti-malware then: If they didn’t then nobody who uses a Mac would ever have been infected.

Could the Macattack it become a more serious problem? Yes it could, and it probably will; despite anything that Apple have to say to the contrary. Prevention being better than cure; it’s a good thing that anti-malware companies are taking action:-

In addition to Symantec’s efforts there are others such as Intego VirusBarrier, to name but one other that specialises in anti-malware for the Mac. Quite obviously Mac users are already protecting themselves: If there weren’t a market then the companies wouldn’t be catering for it.

Symantec claim to have the best firewall for the Mac as a part of NIS4Mac. There are location-based network rules which set different rules based on where you are connecting from, and logged preferences can be set as to which apps access the internet. There’s also blacklist data gathered from their DeepSight network to block access from known malware-bearing sites. NIS4Mac also includes phishing protection based on blacklists and heuristic analyses.

There are also a number of other features that are too numerous and in-depth to mention here.

The question is; is Norton as crappy and resource-hogging on a Mac as it is on a PC? I haven’t tested the software so I can’t say for definite; but knowing Norton; I’d bet that it’s almost certainly some form of bloatware. Norton’s effectiveness on a PC is commonly ranked within the lower echelons of results; so will the Norton software for the Mac be similar for all its bloat? At a guess I’d say ‘probably’.

Are you a Mac user who runs Norton Internet Security for the Mac? What is your opinion of it? It would be interesting to gain insight from a first-hand user.

Microsoft have issued a patch to cure the recent vulnerability issue in all versions of Internet Explorer. They have been rolling it out via Windows Update and Microsoft Update; however some computers may still not have received it yet.

(I state this since at time of writing one of my computers received the patch around midnight GMT, while I have just browsed to Microsoft Update to install it on the other one at 03:30 GMT.)

The patch is MS08-078: Security update for Internet Explorer, and is referenced in the Microsoft Knowledge Base as KB960714. There are several versions available, detailed here. Automatic Updates should deliver the patch to your computer. If you have Automatic Updates switched off, or you don’t receive the update as expected, you should go to http://update.microsoft.com or http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com using Internet Explorer to do so. (Other browsers will not work at these links.) It will be necessary to restart your computer after applying the patch.

If you are unsure whether or not your computer has been updated you should check your update history at one of the links above.

Internet Explorer will be safe again once the patch is applied; but if you’ve downloaded Firefox or another alternative browser and like it, then my advice would be to stick with it. It is nevertheless safe to start using Internet Explorer again following the installation of this patch.

It would appear that the image of invulnerability that Apple attempt to portray in their advertising is becoming threatened. This is now concurrent with a Firefox trojan which tarnishes the open-source community’s similar portrayal, as well as another security vulnerability discovered in Microsoft’s Internet Explorer. The malware writers must be ready for a field-day!

On December 15th 2008, Apple released security updates for Mac OS X 10.4 and 10.5, client and server, bringing the products up to versions 10.4.11 and 10.5.5. The updates address 21 individual vulnerabilities. 7 of the vulnerabilities are in the Adobe Flash plug-in.

If Apple dared to use severity ratings then a number of these updates would have been termed "critical": However the pretence continues, and no doubt Steve Jobs will manage to sweep this unfortunate necessity under the carpet in the usual style.

With all these circumstances which could lead to arbitrary code execution, Apple had no choice but to patch. I wonder how their advertising campaigns will be affected in the light of reality? :-

"I’m a Mac"

"…And I’m a PC."

"What’s up PC? Have you picked up another infection?"

"No Mac; my user stopped using Internet Explorer until Microsoft release a patch for a recently discovered vulnerability. – Just like Apple recently did for you. How many updates was that now..?"

"Oh a few…"

"- Twenty-something springs to mind: That’s rather a lot for an invulnerable system, wouldn’t you agree Mac?"

"OK, OK, But I’m patched now; so I’m still invulnerable. Your patch hasn’t been released yet."

"Now Mac; aren’t we getting a bit above ourselves? Invulnerable systems don’t need patches. – What’s that? We’re out of time? OK I’ll conclude this ad for you:-

Apple – Patching up the Future Invulnerability."

"Hey! Wait a darn minute PC…" (Sound fades out.)

Apple users should update their systems ASAP.

If you guessed from the title of this post that yet another security flaw has been discovered in Internet Explorer; then you’d be right:-

Details of the vulnerability are issued in Microsoft Security Advisory (961051). Vulnerability in Internet Explorer Could Allow Remote Code Execution. Published: December 10, 2008 | Updated: December 15, 2008:-

The vulnerability exists as an invalid pointer reference in the data binding function of Internet Explorer. When data binding is enabled (which is the default state), it is possible under certain conditions for an object to be released without updating the array length, leaving the potential to access the deleted object’s memory space. This can cause Internet Explorer to exit unexpectedly, in a state that is exploitable.

For a less-geeky explanation of the issue; click here.

All you would need to do to allow your machine to become compromised via Internet Explorer is visit a site which has a special malefic type of scripting.

Microsoft have not yet released a patch for the vulnerability, although they are working on it. In the meantime I would suggest that all users of Internet Explorer download Firefox, import their settings to Firefox from IE when Firefox installs, and use Firefox rather than Internet Explorer whenever possible.

If you find that you don’t like Firefox and prefer IE then by all means change back as soon as Microsoft have patched the vulnerability. I advise everyone to avoid using all versions of Internet Explorer whenever possible for the time being.

It’s not every day that you get to see a free keyboard synthesizer program online. Sure, there are loads if you look; but they usually all cost; and unless you’re a professional musician you don’t really want to shell out $$ for something that you’ll only use very occasionally if at all, once the novelty’s worn off.

This little proggy is from Ranfo.com. Ranfo.com is running a promotional program for online Music store affiliate, zzounds.com. Click here to go to the page; from where you can download the software. The program uses the MIDI capabilities of your sound card to generate the tones. It’s not only a piano that is synthesized either: This polyphonic desktop keyboard synthesizer has 128 different voices and sound effects. Whether you have a separate or onboard soundcard, this software will work with it.

"Here is just the thing to express your musical talent and annoy co-workers while you are away from your real piano. Using the MIDI capabilities of your sound card this polyphonic desktop keyboard synthesizer has 128 different voices and sound effects. Play it with the mouse or from the computer keyboard."

-So if you feel like tinkling the ivories; attempting to become the next Jean-Michelle Jarr, or just making a racket born from boredom, this free software is probably for you. Click here to go to the download page.

Do you find that, as time goes by, the number of files and folders on your desktop accumulates to such an extent that there’s just no longer any room for any more?

I’ve been subjected to this problem myself, and although I’ve grouped the numerous individual files into folders, I’ve found that eventually the number of separate folders clutters up the desktop and eventually limits space to the point of overcrowding.

Obviously there is no necessity to have all these files/folders on the desktop; but it’s handy to do so. Even if the folders themselves aren’t actually on the desktop, I probably have a shortcut to the folder in question; and that means another icon cluttering the desktop.

…But with the multi-faceted Windows OS there must be a solution; and low and behold there is: Toolbars.

Toolbars? Yes, you read that right: Toolbars.

In all Windows operating systems, (And also with many Linux operating systems too.) there’s an easy method of turning folders into toolbars. The problem is that there’s only four sides to a screen, so you don’t really want to have loads of taskbars; although you can actually stack taskbars. More on that later.

Above you see my desktop; and you’ll notice a toolbar on each side. The one on the right is what I call the "Files and Shortcuts Toolbar": It contains links to files and shortcuts to files unsurprisingly. The one on the right I call the "Extras Toolbar": It contains everything else, including some shortcuts to programs.

How on earth did I create those? Simplicity itself: Let’s create another toolbar. I’ll talk you through the creation process step by step:-

We start by right-clicking the desktop and hovering over "New" in the menu that appears. Click on "Folder".

Voila! Un folder appeareth.

You’ll notice that I have lots of text files strewn about the desktop. Let’s clear those up and put them in their own toolbar.

First we’ll rename the folder:-

That’ll do it: ‘Not very imaginative, but quite realistic.

Now we collect all those text files, and drag-and-drop them into that folder we just renamed:-

Like that… Hang on: Where have those two toolbars gone? Oh they’re still there; they’re just hiding: I’ll tell you what I mean further on.

So now we try to drag the folder off the screen on the side where we want the toolbar to be. In this case the top of the screen: Left-click on the folder, drag it to the top. – Half of it is off the screen. Let go the left mouse-button, and a toolbar appeareth! A toolbar with all the text-files in it.

If you don’t want the name of every folder to appear next to the folder, taking up space; just right-click on an empty portion of the toolbar and click "show text". If you don’t want the name of the taskbar to appear on it; just right-click on an empty portion of the toolbar and click "show title".

Finally, if you want to make the taskbar thinner; position the mouse-pointer on the very edge of the taskbar so that a line with an arrow at each end appears, right click and hold while you drag the edge of the taskbar to the size you want. The contents of the taskbar will rearrange according to the space that you allow. Tidy up the remaining icons on the desktop and Bob’s your uncle; a tidier desktop.

Remember that I said that the other two taskbars were hiding? This one can hide too: Right-click on a blank area of the taskbar and click "Auto-hide". Also click "Always on top"; otherwise you won’t be able to see the taskbar when you bring it out of hiding as there will be a window on top of it most probably.

I think a video is called for here. OK you asked for it. Please forgive the video quality; I just threw it together, literally right now. I used anything I could lay my hands on to make it: I taped the webcam to the top of a curtain pole to get the right height for the screen even. I’ve not produced any videos as such up until now; except a couple for private viewing among friends. – And you can put that dirty mind away right now!¬

Who was it that commented: "I like reading your blog: It makes me laugh so much."? Well get ready to crease up, as Bodgit & Scarper Studios proudly present… This:-

You’ll notice that my clock was a little slow. – Like 20 years.

It gives you some idea of what I mean I hope, if it plays OK. (Remind me to sack the focus-puller.)

There is just one snag though; that being that the file corresponding to the toolbar has to remain on the desktop: If you move it to another file you get a blank toolbar.

Beggars can’t be choosers though. Having extra toolbars is very handy when using apps such as Windows Live Writer, as I am right now: I don’t have to shrink down the app to the taskbar and clear the desktop to find the file or shortcut I want: I just look in a toolbar and click. Easy-peasy.

Computing made simple; courtesy of kkomp.com.

That’s your lot for this post. – ‘Til next time.

Adios amigos.

Adverts time:

Think yourselves lucky: I could have plastered this post with ads.

oops!

Addendum: It appears that there is at least one other vid of the same nature dealing with this subject:-

‘Nice to see that I’m not alone.

Also see this article.

Adrian Kingsley-Hughes, for ZDnet, has performance-tested a pre-beta build of Windows 7 against Windows Vista. The results are indeed promising:

"Conclusion

What we have here is one set of data points for one particular system, but I think that the results are very promising. The fact that Windows 7 comes out top in three out of four of these tests at this early stage is very promising indeed. The boot time and PCMark Vantage results are particularly good.

I remember benchmarking an early pre-beta of Vista and it was awful compared to XP at the time. At this stage I can only assume that the RTM release of Windows 7 will offer more performance than this build, and will at the RTM stage be better than Vista. This is great for those who are concerned about the OS soaking up too much system resources." :-

http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=3182&page=6

Pre-beta builds notoriously suffer from performance-deficits that do not appear in the final RTM version, nor indeed in some of the actual betas themselves. The fact that Windows 7 beats Vista in a significant number of performance-tests at pre-beta stage appears to indicate that the final retail version is going to be good indeed.

The question in my mind, though, is; despite its advantages over and above Vista, will it be a better performer than XP SP3? We’ll have to wait and see.

I wouldn’t describe building a PC as "easy"; but it’s not as difficult as one might imagine. Unlike constructing an electronic circuit, such as an amplifier, for example; there’s nothing extremely fiddly, such as soldering or quality engineering to worry about: That’s all been taken care of already by the component manufacturers.

It’s like putting a jigsaw together: Every piece fits in a certain configuration as a part of the whole. The pieces are already made, so you don’t have to make them yourself: you only need to fit them together in the correct fashion.

*At this point I’ll state that this article isn’t a comprehensive how-to: It’s just some notes from my recent rebuild experience.*

You may have heard that I recently had a computer die on me. I’d built it from scrap parts as a replacement for another one that went funny earlier. I have no idea exactly what caused the fault that killed it. It blue-screened and then just died a second later. Following on from that when I tried to restart it the BIOS couldn’t find the processor; so I assumed that the chipset had fried: ‘New motherboard required if this was the case.

There’s the old construction on the left. (Excuse the picture quality.) I’d already started taking it apart at that point, so it does look rather untidy. I’ve just rebuilt this machine; and I’m actually writing this article on it.

I stripped it down and started again; therefore I in essence built the machine from scratch. While doing so I took pics of a number of stages and of some of the parts, with a view to blogging the event. This blog has suffered from a lack of posts due to this project and other work, so I  thought it a good idea to use this project as subject matter.

First things first; a motherboard:

I purchased a fairly cheap Gigabyte motherboard for this project: It cost me about £38 at the time. I’d decided to use a socket AM2 AMD Athlon 64 x 2, 2.2GHz processor, as in my other working machine, for this one.

Some people have a low-opinion of AMD chips. Myself, I’ve always found them to be reliable and sturdy. Also they’re cheaper and the motherboards that run them cost less too. Since this was a rebuild that I didn’t want to spend too much on I was quite happy with my choice.

Of course I’d need a CPU cooler too, which consists of a heatsink and fan in order to prevent the processor from overheating. I had this one in stock and was going to use it. However I found that the original cooler was a better one, and surprisingly that it fitted onto a socket AM2 fitting perfectly; therefore having cleaned it up I used it instead.

I also invested in a new hard-drive. I could have used the old one; there was nothing wrong with it. – But I added the old one to my other machine and started this build with a brand new disk.

All-in-all the motherboard, processor, and hard-drive, cost me £108 Inc. VAT at 15%.

So to construction; and the pic on the right shows the case with the new motherboard fitted.

Always remember before starting out; earth thyself: Static electricity builds up in your body and on your clothes, and it kills computer components. personally I always wear an earthed wrist-strap when building computers, just to take any static safely to earth rather than letting it flow through the components I’m using and killing them.

After this point I got a buzz,  and I just ploughed on ahead with construction while not bothering to take any more pics of it.

In short, though, it was just a matter from here of fitting the PSU, connecting the appropriate power leads to the motherboard, inserting the processor into the socket on the motherboard, pulling the little lever while pressing down on it to seal it in the socket, smearing some heat-conducting grease on the top of it, fitting and aligning the cooler, and pulling down the lever on it to tighten it to the surface after clipping the clips onto the processor surround.

Installing the RAM: I inserted 2 x 1GB 667MHz DDR2 sticks into the memory slots and pushed down until they clicked into place.

Following that I connected up the front panel to the appropriate pins. I had problems with the sound jacks on the front as the connections didn’t match with the new motherboard at all. In the end I left the two front sound jacks unconnected, and only connected the 2 front USB ports, the HD activity LED, and the power-indicator LED, to the appropriate pins.

I popped the new HDD into a drive-bay, screwed it in, and connected it up to a SATA power lead from the PSU and to the motherboard’s SATA controller via a SATA connector lead. The same with the DVD-RW drive. (I used the existing DVD-RW as there was no point getting a new one. – Same with the existing floppy-drive.

"Floppy-drive! Why bother with a floppy?" You ask.

I like floppy-drives. I find them useful. I also still like CRT monitors and Outlook Express too. That’s just me: I don’t expect anyone to do similar if they don’t want to.)

So having put the thing together it was time for the initial power-up: Fingers crossed. Bingo: POST. I did take a pic of it, but it was so crappy I deleted it.

After a few minor adjustments to the BIOS, it’s time to install Windows XP:

Pop the XP pro CD into the DVD-RW drive… Let’s get the HDD formatted: NTFS – A decent file-system.

Install Windows…

- Et voila mes amis.

That wasn’t exactly the hardest thing on earth to do; although the construction is the easy, quick, and interesting part for me: It’s the 12 or so hours afterwards installing, optimising, and configuring, all the software that really gets my goat: That’s one reason I don’t do upgrades as a rule for customers: Even after spending 12 hours on it; they still moan about something: That’s why I just build the comp and install and optimise Windows and the motherboard drivers after a new build only, professionally. People can add their own software afterwards and screw up the operating system any way they like once the comp is delivered and paid for.

So that’s the rebuild; and it is a rather excellent job although I do say so myself.

A lot of people already know how to do this; in which case this article is not for them. However some newbies or the non-technically savvy may not be quite so up to speed on this. Worry not; if you fit this category then this article’s for you:-

The Device Manager is the place where your identified hardware components are listed, as well as any unidentified hardware. Normally hardware components are fully identified by the operating system after the appropriate driver has been installed. If no driver or the wrong driver has been installed, you may see a yellow ? or an ! accompanying a listing such as "Unknown Device" or "PCI device", "scanner", "PCI multimedia device", or similar.

This can be somewhat unhelpful, as a large number of different classes of device are connected to the PCI bus for instance, and it sometimes takes an amount of expertise to decipher which device the Device Manager is referring to in these cases.

For instance; a PCI multimedia device could be a component of a sound card, or the sound card itself, either built in to your existing motherboard, or separate from it. The identification issue can at times require a knowledge of the computer’s components, as well as a bit of deduction, in order to arrive at the correct conclusion. If you’re unsure I suggest you either embark on some online-sourced detective work, or consult a professional.

Moving on… If your device has a driver, then a brief description of the device and of the driver will be available in the Device Manager:

Some of the listed groups may be fairly obvious as to what they contain; but just for fun I’ll list some of the less obvious ones below:-

At the top you’ll see the name of your computer. (If Windows has named your computer for you, and/or you’re not happy with the current name, and you want to change it, right click the "My Computer" icon, click properties, and select the Computer Name tab.) Below your computer’s name you’ll see a listing of device categories. (In the example above the first of these is "Asus Other Devices": These are extra devices specific to my graphics card. Your computer may not have this category of devices unless you are running a PCIe Asus graphics card.)

Moving down you have "Computer". The information in this section, which can be obtained by clicking on the + sign within the adjacent box, describes what type of computer you are running.: For instance "ACPI Multiprocessor PC" if you are running a dual-core or quad-core setup (A setup using a multi-cored processor.), or "ACPI Uniprocessor PC" if you are running a single-cored setup.

Disk Drives lists all your hard-disks; including any USB or Firewire external drives, disks or flash-keys, whatever.

Display Adapters section lists all your graphics adapters: This can include the graphics adapter built into your chipset on your motherboard, if your computer uses onboard graphics; or can include your AGP, PCI, or PCIe graphics cards that have been installed as extras to improve the graphics performance of your computer.

You may see a section called "Human Interface Devices": This, as its name suggests, is where devices that directly interface with humans are listed. (Although keyboards and mice have their own separate sections in most cases.) It’s not always clear what the devices in this section are, even when properly identified: Some may be listed as "USB Human Interface Device" only, or "HID-Compliant Device". Don’t worry too much about this: It’s just one of the foibles of using Microsoft software; that being that not everything is as user-friendly as it could be.

IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers contains devices that directly control the functions of your disk-drives. The settings of these devices in Device Manager can be tweaked to improve the performance of your computer; but unless you know what you’re doing I suggest that you leave them as they are. There’s usually at least one Primary IDE Controller and one Secondary IDE Controller listed. (These appear and are related to your disk-drives even if your computer has SATA drives installed. This is due to the way that the Windows XP SATA drivers produce an emulated IDE environment to the other components, in order to lull the other hardware into the impression that everything’s been just as it is now since the turn of the 21st Century: That saves a lot of hassle in the case of this particular operating system.)

Network Adapters: I don’t know why they didn’t name this section "Network Interface Devices", as basically that’s what the devices in this section are: They interface your computer with external network(s); such as the internet, or such as a bluetooth network.

SCSI and RAID Controllers: Some computers won’t have this section. In short, these controllers allow the computer to run a Redundant Array (More than 1) of Independent Disks, configured to minimise data loss in the event of an internal fault. The fact that the computer has one of these controllers doesn’t mean, necessarily, that it is configured for RAID or SCSI, or that it has more than one hard-disk installed. It just indicates that the machine has the ability to do so.

System Devices: I could write thousands of pages on this section, had I the time and/or inclination to do so. In short this is a listing of the devices on the motherboard that aren’t mentioned elsewhere. Most have drivers that come with the operating system, created by Microsoft in 2001. Some may have a different manufacturer’s name attached to them, and are specific to your particular motherboard.

Universal Serial Bus Devices: USB devices in short. Other than the various USB root hubs on the motherboard, which basically supply power at 5 Volts to each USB socket; and the USB host controllers on the motherboard or on the USB extension PCI card inside the computer’s case (A USB controller indicates a USB 1 or USB 1.1 capable-device; whereas an enhanced USB host controller indicates a USB 2 capable-device.) – This section lists all devices that you have plugged into a USB port.

Right click on a device listing and a number of options are presented to you:-

"Update Driver" will open the Hardware Update Wizard, and can search Windows Update for an updated device driver for that device. Unfortunately not all driver updates from Windows Update actually work in a particular machine. I’ve just, at time, of writing been offered a driver update for my graphics card by Windows Update; which was strange as I already have the latest nVidia drivers installed. That update crashed my machine twice when I tried installing it, so I’m staying with what I’ve got.

The true updated drivers come from the device manufacturers themselves. It’s worth checking their website once in a while for updated driver versions for the devices that you run.

When Windows starts it scans all your hardware and builds up the list that you see in Device Manager. "Scan for hardware changes" scans your hardware again without restarting Windows; and any subsequent changes that it finds are reflected in the Device Manager after the scan. (Nevertheless; after installing a new driver, it is always better to restart Windows in order that the new driver is written to disk and properly activated from startup.)

There are 2 ways to get into the device’s properties dialogue: The first being by clicking "Properties" as shown in the illustration above. The second is to double-left-click on the individual device listing. Either way you’ll arrive at something like this:-

The General tab is as above, and tells you the identity, location, and status of the device.

The Advanced Settings tab only appears on a few of the Properties dialogue boxes depending upon which device is in question. As I stated before; unless you know exactly what you’re doing it’s best to leave anything under this tab as it is.

The Driver tab (Above.) gives details of the device’s currently installed driver with several options:-

Driver Details shows extended details of the driver.

Update Driver opens the Hardware Update Wizard with respect to that particular device.

Roll Back Driver reverts the current driver version installation to the previous installed driver version, should there have been one.

Uninstall uninstalls the device in question from the system until the next reboot or until Scan for Hardware Changes is clicked; at which point the device will be rediscovered by the operating system, and any suitable driver residing on disk installed.

Now we know what everything does; let’s look at some instances where we’d use the Device Manager:-

We hear that the manufacturer of one of the devices that is being used on our computer, a RAID controller in this case, has released an updated driver for their device. We go to their website and read about the driver, following which we upload the driver package to disk. The driver files are not packaged in a self-installing .exe file in this case, so we need to get Windows to install the new files. We go to the SCSI and RAID Controllers section in the Device Manager and select the appropriate device that we want to update. Let’s say that this device is listed as "Acme RAID controller". We right-click on the device’s name and click "Update Driver".

The Hardware Update Wizard appears and we first of all try the easy method of clicking "Install the software automatically" to see if we have any luck with that.

The computer searches the hard-disk but fails to pick up and install the new driver: It didn’t see it and/or it didn’t recognise it. We have to tell the computer where it is now; so we click *Install from a list or specific location". We tell the computer to look at the specific file that we downloaded and it sees and installs it.

BUT after using the device we find that the last driver was in fact better in that the device worked better using it…So we open the properties dialogue, select the Driver tab, click the "Roll Back Driver" button, and the machine dumps the driver that we just installed and reverts to the original driver that we were using before.

OR

We install a new device, a scanner perhaps, by plugging it into the one of the USB ports on the computer. The device is recognised by the computer (As a scanner.) but the operating system is unable to find a suitable driver for it and install it automatically. We browse to the device’s manufacturer’s website and download a driver for it, find the unspecified device in the Device Manager, right-click the entry, and click "Update Driver"… See above.

This isn’t a fully comprehensive guide by any means; but it should go a long way towards helping newbies to understand the Device Manager, and also to help the not-so-tech-savvy to use it if necessary.

Please do comment on this article if you feel that there’s anything you’d like to say.

When I heard the news the first thing that I thought was “Excellent; at last the iPhone will get cheaper.” – If Wal-Mart drop the price of an iPhone then other American stores will start doing likewise; and eventually the price-drop will find its way to the UK and I’ll be able to get my hands on an iPhone at a discount.

There was just one crucial factor that I didn’t consider, though; that being JOBSWEH.

Steve Jobs (Jobsweh) has his finger on the pulse in every way possible; from what an individual user can and can’t run on their iPhone, to exactly how much retailers sell it for, and consequently what percentage of that ends up in his pocket.

‘Cut-price iPhone? Pah; no chance. Not if Jobsweh can help it.

“Employees in the cell-phone departments at five California stores, contacted by phone today, said Wal-Mart will offer iPhones by the end of December. Employees are currently being trained on how to sell the device, all five said.”

I dread to think how they’re being trained to sell an iPhone:

“…Yes this is an Apple product. As such it’s immune to any and all malware: Only Microsoft products are susceptible to that. Microsoft’s products suck, but all Apple products are personally controlled by Steve Jobs, aka Jobsweh; God of all things Apple…”

In September, Jobsweh got Best Buy, a US electronics retailer, to start selling iPhones. Apple stores were deluged and overwhelmed back when the current iPhone was released in July 2008. Jobsweh was seeking to expand the market to prevent such a mass rush on his stores whenever there would be a next time. AT&T had also been selling iPhones; but their cred was and still is tumbling down the gurgler, as they tried to lock all purchasers into a long-term contract with them, and then increased their prices while their service standards worsened. Although they still have the exclusive US service-provider rights for the iPhone’s signal, people possibly weren’t willing to give them a profit on the unit itself in addition to that which they made with their service. – That’s my theory anyway – So the market needed to be expanded.

Maybe, though, there is a possibility of a cheap iPhone after all? :

“Analysts say Apple may offer a discontinued 4-gigabyte version through Bentonville, Arkansas-based Wal-Mart and sell it for $99. Apple currently sells two models at $199 and $299.”

“A $99, Apple-branded cell phone is inevitable,” said Shaw Wu, an analyst for Kaufman Brothers in San Francisco. “One of the key things Apple needs to do to drive broader iPhone adoption is to build a more complete product line” with low- end, mid-range and high-end products, Wu said in a Dec. 5 note.

Apple spokesman Steve Dowling wouldn’t respond to the report and said the company “does not comment on rumor or speculation.” Wal-Mart spokesman Dan Fogleman said the company hasn’t made an official announcement on an iPhone offering and has no comment. AT&T spokesman Mark Siegel declined to comment.”

Well despite my distaste for Apple in some regards, they are on the up so I can’t knock them. Although their share price has dropped considerably this year, along with pretty much all others, they’re bouncing back and bucking the trend.

Good luck to you Wal-Mart. – But keep your eye on Jobsweh; I wouldn’t put my trust in him totally if I were you.

All quotations are from Bloomberg.com http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=a4YIU21gLaSY

“Windows 7 basically takes Windows one step closer to the design aesthetic of the Mac, where form is valued over function. I’m not sure this is the right strategy. Simplicity, taken in isolation, may seem like a good idea. But I’m afraid that in Windows 7, Microsoft is sacrificing too much in its bid to be more like Apple. And it’s the users of Windows who will pay the price.”

- So says blogger Paul Thurrott in his article “Windows 7: Simple Vs. Easy” 

Me; I’m not really in the know: I haven’t even seen the pre-beta. – But I want to highlight this suggestion that Microsoft are trying to make Windows more like Mac osX.

ZDnet’s Mary Joe Foley commented in a part of her response to Thurrott’s article:

“If I wanted a Mac-like environment, I’d buy a Mac. I want an computing environment that helps me get my work done and doesn’t require a how-to manual to figure out which icon does what. Maybe Microsoft could introduce “Windows 7 Luddite Edition” for those of us who value function over form?”

I suggest that you read the two articles right through, and then, if you would be so kind, state your opinion by means of a comment below. What I’m asking is; do you think Microsoft are in danger of making Windows too like Mac osX? Also do you think that they are attempting to present Windows 7 as a simpler-to-use operating system by hiding the complexities; in other words sacrificing function to promote form?

I would imagine that, even in 7, it’s possible to access all the usual functions from the command line, even if those functions may be buried. Not all users are actually familiar with the command line though – After all this is Windows, not Linux.

I miss the point maybe; or is there some benefit to be gained by encouraging the stupid and lazy to become stupider and lazier by hiding things they can’t understand and can’t be bothered to learn about?

A 32GB external solid-state drive that connects by both USB and e-SATA! – That’s what Maxell say they’ll be releasing in time for Christmas this year (2008).

Yes indeedy; available mid to late December 2008 in the UK: If you pre-order you might just be lucky enough to bag one or more of these before Christmas to give to the geek in your life, (Even keep for yourself why not: They say charity begins at home – so if you live alone then spoil yourself.)

It looks much like a USB flash drive, but is allegedly faster; reading at 24MB/s, and writing at 16MB/s: faster than the respective 18MB/s and 8MB/s data speeds of a normal flash drive. This is using USB 2.0. It appears that they weren’t far-sighted enough to make the device USB 3.0 compatible. Possibly the speeds would have been faster if they had.

But we’re forgetting about e-SATA. Connect this device to an e-SATA port and it flies: It’s claimed that you’ll get 75MB/s read and 25MB/s write speeds over e-SATA. – Now that’s fast.

Another drawback, though, is the drive’s small capacity. OK, I admit you can store a lot on 32GB, but people appear to prefer 1TB and 500GB external hard-drives. This isn’t yet possible with any SSD drive, of course, so it has to be smaller.

In my opinion Maxell should have waited until it was possible to build a larger SSD external drive; and I think that this will be one of those novelty items that will end up in a museum. One day someone will be telling their grandchildren that 32MB was the biggest solid-state drive that could be built at the beginning of the 21st Century, as they plug their 1TB SSD drive into their 3GHz palmtop computer with 16GB RAM and take notes and photos with it.

The word from Maxell is:

“SSD is the revolutionary means of storing data, essential for those who have ever experienced the stress and frustration of a slow, damaged or broken USB, or for those who are merely dedicated admirers of state-of-the-art technology. If you are looking for the most reliable, rapid and robust portable storage device, this SDD is unquestionably for you.”

Hmm; but at a price-tag of £120, (Approximately $190 at time of going to press.) it’s a bit steep at just under £4 a gigabyte.

What’s your opinion? ‘Too small and too pricey? ‘Worth buying for novelty value? ‘Cost-effective for speed? – Or just a total waste of money?

Malware writers have started Christmas early this year (2008): A backdoor trojan used in malicious spam campaigns is linked to from a bogus animated electronic Christmas card from postcards.org . When activated, the file allows hackers to access the machine’s resources via IRC.

This campaign has been around since November, and the malware writers are well in tune with the current economic situation. E-card sites are promoting e-cards as a cheap environmentally-friendly alternative to paper and card.

As the trojan installs the Christmas jollity continues with a picture of a Christmas tree. How coy.

Your computer is being targeted in many different ways these days, especially if you’re running Windows; and users should be vigilant and more careful than ever about what they click on. The best way to be is, if you even suspect it just that tiny bit, don’t click on it. Delete it instead – Don’t let curiosity kill the cat – or your computer either come to that.

Previously available only to a small group of enthusiasts, the beta of Vista SP2 is now being offered to the public in general via Windows Update

According to Microsoft vice president Mike Nash:

“The customer preview program is intended for technology enthusiasts, developers, and IT pros who would like to test Service Pack 2 in their environments and with their applications prior to final release. For most customers, our best advice would be to wait until the final release prior to installing this service pack.”

- So most casual users of Vista should avoid using it and not bother downloading it until it is released as a non-beta final-release, RTM, in the first half of 2009.

SP2 is reported to bring support for Blu-ray and Bluetooth 2.1, in addition to bringing a lot of performance tweaks. This is a bit like XP; which wasn’t really all that hot until SP2. Having said that, though, there weren’t nearly as many problems with XP as there were with Vista. I look forward to Windows Seven’s release, no matter how much they continue to tweak Vista and make it work as it should have done from day 1.

Feel free to comment on this article: There’s a comment box below – It’s not just solely for decoration.

Open=Source takes one in the eye as Trojan.PWS.ChromeInject.B  secretly works as a Firefox plugin and steals bank login details on any of 103 domains belonging to mainly non-US banks. BitDefender identifies ChromeInject as “…the first malware that targets Firefox.”

Fortunately the infection rate thusfar is low; but there’s always a chance of this type of thing escalating. The false plugin works by running a JavaScript and a Windows executable file: Seemingly this trojan only affects Firefox running in Windows; Linux and Mac are most likely safe, at least from this version of this trojan. How long this will be the case is anyone’s guess.

Is this the start of a long-running malware campaign against Firefox. Will a plethora of variations of this trojan be targeted at Firefox by the malware writers? Judging by previous form I would expect that to be the case. What would you suggest? Do you agree with me, or do you think that this is just a one-off?

Apple may not want to admit it, but there is already Mac-malware going around. Security experts have long raised concerns about a Mac-attack suddenly arising from a particularly virulent piece of malware. Meanwhile Apple continue to stress that Macs are invulnerable and don’t require anti-malware protection in order to generate their better-than-a-PC image.

Apple employees at their stores deny any need for anti-malware and anti-virus for a Mac. Apple’s own ads imply that a mac is pretty invulnerable. Yet despite this, even the Apple.com website has links to anti-malware solutions for the Mac running osX. Why would that be if there was no threat?

I’m sorry to say it, Apple-lovers, but you are being conned by Jobsweh and his followers. When the malware-writers have waited long enough to lull you all into a false sense of security while the Apple movement grows, and many more people are conned into getting an "Invulnerable" Mac, they’ll release their malware into the wild.

It’s obvious that Apple know that this is going to happen someday. Windows needs antivirus solutions, despite the fact that many of them are inadequate. At least it’s some protection rather than none. Windows gets targeted a million times more than a Mac; true, but as the number of Mac users grows then so will the target on the Mac osX operating system, and malware writers will strike a totally unprepared and defenseless market sector.

I wonder how Apple will try to worm their way out of it when it finally happens? What do you think?

- ‘Breaking away from the technology-oriented theme for this post, a little music to delight your listening lug-holes:

I saw the URL to this posted by the Kadaitcha Man in the newsgroups. I so liked this I just had to post it: Indie duo Pomplamoose, with a great rendition of the Julie Andrews song "My Favourite Things". I do suggest you get the mp3 if you like it yourself. Browse over to http://myspace.com/pomplamoosemusic  to hear more of their music, see more of their vids, order more mp3s, and not forgetting Pomplamoose soap.

About Pomplamoose

Jack Conte and Nataly Dawn started making music together in the summer of ’08, and decided to form a band. Pomplamoose thus represents the collaborative efforts of the two afore-mentioned musicians. It also means grapefruit in French.

I’m getting hooked actually; the more of their music I hear the more I like it. In my opinion this couple are very talented.

This year, Microsoft forced major retailers to stop supplying XP. In January 2009 even small system builders such as myself will be stopped from supplying XP. Will that be a death knell for XP?

Not immediately, no; but if the pre-beta code reports are anything to go by, then Windows Seven may well be the start of the end for this almost seven-year-old operating system.

Some reports I’ve heard indicate that Microsoft will be launching Seven in October 2009. According to PCWorld.com:

"The word on the blogosphere is that Windows 7 should be released to manufacturing in October 2009 with general availability by November".

Microsoft haven’t yet released anything concrete yet as far as I know – Other than declaring that the new OS will be launched in the latter half of 2009, however some bloggers may be privy to insider information that I have not yet received.

Windows Vista; the disaster of an operating system in many ways, and the major trigger of the minor popularity-loss for the Softies, which did more good for its predecessor XP and the Apple Mac with its osX Unix operating system than anything else, has kept most of those users who continue to use Microsoft’s operating systems (Including myself.) with XP for the time being. In fact this blog’s visitor count indicates that almost 5 times more visitors use XP than use Vista, with a third as many people as those using Vista on a Mac using osX.

Seven is coming; and in my opinion we’ll probably be seeing most of those who upgraded from XP to Vista upgrading to Seven in 2009; as well as probably at least two-thirds of the XP users. That will be probably just as much a death knell for Vista as it will be for XP, if not even more so.

Seven will work on the same hardware as Vista; so there’s really no reason for Vista users not to upgrade. XP users boxes will be starting to clap out in a lot of cases, so those affected will no doubt upgrade equipment and operating system too.

If you have a perfectly good computer that’s still running XP, and either you can’t afford to, don’t want to, or simply can’t move to Seven because of the hardware requirements, then don’t worry:

Currently, as stated in the Microsoft XP Product Support Lifecycle page, partially shown above; they will continue mainstream support for XP until April 2009 – As they are currently doing that is – after which they’ll only be continuing support regarding security issues from that date until the currently scheduled day in April 2014 when XP becomes obsolete.

Then XP will go the way of 9x and ME. By then, however, Seven’s successor will probably have been long released, Vista will have been condemned, and maybe even a successor to Seven’s successor will be in beta?

One of my computers that I recently built from scrap components probably isn’t capable of running anything greater than Vista Home Basic. It has a 64-bit capable motherboard running a 32-bit AMD Sempron 1800MHz processor in a socket configuration that’s already almost obsolete; AMD socket 754. I don’t think they made any dual-core processors in that socket, and even if I could upgrade to a single-core Athlon 64 by buying second-hand, I wouldn’t bother upgrading to Vista. – So that’s one computer which’ll be running XP to 2014; if it lasts that long, that is.

Feel free to comment generally on anything you like in this article: There is a comment box below for that purpose. Have a good day/evening/night/morning, wherever you are on the planet.